New software that takes a patient's height and weight into account can reduce radiation exposure from CT scans by as much as 37 percent, according to new research. Doctors at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center developed the software that they say can be used for children and adults. The results of their research were published yesterday in the journal Radiology. The software helps administer safer, more consistent doses, said Dr. David Larson, radiology quality and safety director at the medical center and principal creator of the technology.
People who think they didn't get sick from a nationwide meningitis outbreak caused by contaminated steroid injections used to treat back pain may want to think again. Doctors at hospitals in Michigan did MRI scans of people who had been given tainted injections but didn't report symptoms of meningitis afterwards. About 20 percent of the 172 people tested had suspicious-looking MRIs, and 17 ended up needing surgery to treat fungal infections in or around the spine. The patients had gotten steroid injections about three months before the MRI, in mid to late 2012.
CHICAGO (Reuters) - Shares of U.S. hospital operators have been on a tear this year, on average posting triple the gains of the broader stock market, as investors tallied up the benefits of President Barack Obama's healthcare reform. While some on Wall Street have held back amid signs of trouble as U.S. states prepare to implement the reform law, long-term investors still see more reward than risk on the horizon for hospital stocks. They expect company earnings to strengthen as more Americans gain insurance coverage and hospitals lose less money treating the uninsured. The reform law has spurred consolidation among hospitals, and further merger activity could lift valuations.
If doctors and patients used prescription drugs more wisely, they could save the U.S. health care system at least $213 billion a year, by reducing medication overuse, underuse and other flaws in care that cause complications and longer, more-expensive treatments, researchers conclude. The new findings by the IMS Institute for Healthcare Informatics improve on numerous prior efforts to quantify the dollars wasted on health care. Numerous experts previously have estimated that tens of billions, perhaps hundreds of billions of dollars, could be better used each year to improve patient care and outcomes and to slow down spending by government health programs, insurers and consumers.
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. -- State health officials said Wednesday they were beefing up security of the statewide prescription drug database to protect patient information, a week after the American Civil Liberties Union said patients' personal information was leaked. The Florida Department of Health said it was working with law enforcement officials and Attorney General Pam Bondi to explore addition safety measures, including limiting the number of people from state agencies allowed to use the database, creating a system requiring all agency administrators be notified when a user requests database information and potentially disqualifying users who compromise patient information. State officials said they also want more clearly displayed penalties for improper disclosure on the program's web-based disclosure screens.
A man in a Saudi hospital has pneumonia. The patient in the room next door gets sick, and before anyone realizes what is happening he infects seven others, each of whom infects at least one more. An outbreak is born. A detailed investigation of the viral illness first detected last year in Saudi Arabia has revealed the chilling ease with which the virus can spread to ill patients in the hospital — and its ability to infect some close contacts like hospital staff and family members who were in good health. A report on the investigation published Wednesday in The New England Journal of Medicine pinpointed the time it takes for a person to get sick after being exposed to the virus, a median of 5.2 days.